Remember Ba'al of Peor

I remember the Alamo. I remember the Maine. I remember Pearl Harbor. I remember September 11.

But what about when the national injustice comes about by our hand? Until my most recent reading of the Old Testament, I wouldn't have been able to recall the Ba'al Peor heresy. And though it was commited by a nation not my own, it was commited by a people to whom I owe a great deal for my instruction in faith.

Ba'al of Peor was a bad thing, a memorable thing, a thing decried from the time of Moses to the time of Hosea (i.e. a really long time), an example of Israel's tendency in specific (and man's historic trend in general) to launch sneak attacks against God. Our lips praise him, but our hearts wander into darkness, until the moment of assault, of treason, of adultery.

We commit injustices against our Lord. We remember the Alamo, the Maine, and Pearl Harbor, but can never seem to recall Ba'al of Peor.

About Those Old (New) Gods...

They are important to know.

We like to think of Molek and Ba'al and Beelzebub and Asherah and Hadad and Dagon and especially the great and despicable El (not to be confused with the real Elohim (our God.)) as these old idols of an ancient past that predated organized monotheism.

Nonsense.

Molek and Ba'al and all the rest, though well-established in Canaan at the time of the birth of the nation of Israel, are new gods. Very new. And, though the Ugarit religion is long dead, the spirit of the old new gods shines just as brightly. We feign intellectual naivety so that we can enjoy their attraction without guilt. Because we don't know our Moleks from our Asherah poles we can block their influence from our mind.

Have I become a sedated pupa, blissed out in the Matrix? Do we even know who our new gods, our old gods, are?